Joe Hogan was a qualified applicant who already earned an associate degree in nursing, but wanted to farther his education by pursing a bachelor degree. “Hogan worked as a nursing supervisor in a medical center in Columbus near MUW.” Hogan was very optimistic he would get accepted, so he applied to MUW because it was close to his house. In the end, MUW allow Hogan to audit courses he was interested in taking, but he could not enroll for credits. The school rejected his application because on gender. As a result of his rejection from MUW, Hogan contacted the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) and hire local attorney Wilbur Colom. Then Hogan proceed in 1979 to filing a suit in the United States District Court for Northern District of Mississippi…show more content… In this instance, the exclusion of males from a nursing school violates the equal protection clause. The district court applied the rational basis test, and rule in favor of MUW. The rational basis test is on the bottom tier of equal protection analysis, which questions the rationally of the issue. The test reviews whether the government actions were rationally related to a legitimate governmental interest. When a court applies this judicial review there is a 99% percent chance the ruling will favor the state. The court sided with MUW in the district court, to protect the state interest in maintaining a single sex educational program. However, the ruling was reversed by the Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit in Mississippi. When a party is seeking a statue in gender classification the state must show proof. In court view, the state had the heavier burden of explaining the gender-based classification was necessary, which the state lacked to proved. When relying on precedent regarding gender classification, courts did not recognize gender-based statue as a violation of the equal protection clause. In Reed v Reed, 404 U.S 71
